News Update

Hundreds of thousand have been displaced by the violence. Credit: REUTERS/alertnet.org

May 14, 2009 — WESTPORT, Conn. — As increasing numbers of Pakistani families flee their homes due to intense fighting in the country's North West Frontier Province, Save the Children is moving quickly to address the health needs of children and their families displaced by the fighting. Read the latest press release.

Approximately 150,000 to 200,000 people have been displaced in the last four days, with some estimates suggesting that another 300,000 more people are likely to move in the coming days. This would bring to more than a million the number of children and adults who have fled conflict in northwest Pakistan since August 2008, according the U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR.

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Our Response

Save the Children — as part of a coordinated response and in partnership with the government of NWFP and local authorities —  will be working to ensure that children and families affected by the crisis receive emergency assistance, including health services and hygiene and household supplies. The agency also will work to provide protection and education programs for children in camps or temporary shelter. Most displaced families (more than 80 percent) are not living in the camps.

Save the Children is focusing its efforts on separated children, women-headed households, families with children under 5, and families that include an injured or chronically ill family member.

People are living without basic necessities. Credit: REUTERS/STR courtesy www.alertnet.org

"Children in this area are extremely vulnerable. The area is prone to manmade and natural disasters, and the lengthy conflict and intermittent fighting over the past one-and-a-half years has stressed household reserves, disrupted the local economy and resulted in the destruction of hundreds of schools," said Ned Olney, who heads Save the Children's humanitarian response efforts globally. "People have, in many cases, left their homes with little more than the clothes on their backs, and there is a desperate need for food and other basic items. Basic health services are also badly over-stretched."

Save the Children has worked in Pakistan for more than 25 years — helping to improve the lives and well-being of Afghan refugees and Pakistani children and women. The agency has a strong portfolio of health, education and emergency response programs, while continuing to address the needs of Afghan children and families who remain in Pakistan. Save the Children also is continuing to work in areas affected by the 2005 earthquake. 

Learn more about Save the Children's work in Pakistan